Lucky (IV) (2020) User Reviews (57)

I could watch this many times and never understand properly....

[K_Rad88 · 4/10 · 15 April 2021]

Whilst I appreciate the premise, I was a little lost.

Who killed her husband and best friend? If it's a metaphor, and the murderer was really a composition of many different men from the past who've perhaps made May feel unsafe, how did people actually die from a metaphor - did May kill them? I really wanted to enjoy this I just sorely feel like they rushed the premise and it wasn't explained well enough with very little explanation or closure. Blood was left each time, but how is that even possible 😂😂😂

Didn't quite work

[bangel3322 · 4/10 · 11 March 2021]

I appreciate directors and writers who try to do things a little differently to the constant identical horror movies we see everyday. And I like the fact we get presented with movies that aren't as straightforward as others. This movies reminds me of Mother! While I like the ideas behind the movies and trying to get people to think outside the box, the execution of these films needs to be a little tidier. They start off really interesting and as a viewer, you're really intrigued and excited....and then they just go to a weird place and don't come back, and you're sitting there thinking...'huh?'

There were several plot holes in this film and many things that were introduced were not explained at all. Not everyone who watched will be able to deduce certain clues brought up. It doesn't need to be a blatant in your face explanation that takes away from the mystery of the film, but it does need to be addressed in a way the viewer is like, 'ah, ok...I see what they did there.' It felt unfinished at 1hr 20mins. Could have packed a bit more in to wrap things up.

I get the point but it's a poor film

[Cax019 · 3/10 · 26 April 2021]

People giving high reviews criticising the lower scored reviews for "missing the point " no we are not missing the point . We get it, it's a film about how women face fear and danger everyday. That they should feel lucky to even be alive. This is not tense or well acted at all, it is so badly executed, what could have been a solid metaphorical film turned into a bore-fest.

FAIL, REPEAT

[kirbylee70-599-526179 · 2/10 · 31 August 2021]

I love the fact that women are directing horror films more and more often. Past films have shown that they are as in touch with the genre as any male director out there. Films like PET SEMETARY and SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE are direct proof of that. Unfortunately as with male directors there are sometimes efforts that fail as well. LUCKY is one of those.

Screenwriter/star Brea Grant plays May, a self-help author who's in a bit of a slump. Waiting to hear from her publisher about the next book they want her to write she leaves her agents office with a box of books in hand for the next signing. In the parking garage she hears a soft scream, looks around seeing nothing and goes about heading home.

That night she begins to talk to her husband Ted (Dhruv Uday Singh) about getting married but he changes the subject. In bed that night she hears something and looks out the window to see a masked man looking up. She wakes Ted and he tells her it's just the man who comes there every night to murder her. Stunned at this response she goes with him to find out what's going on but no one is there.

The next morning they argue about what transpired and Ted tells her he's leaving until she decides to calm down. That night, home alone, the stranger reappears. May wounds him and calls the police but when they arrive he's nowhere to be found. They file a report and leave.

Each passing day the same situation repeats itself. The stranger shows, May kills him, the body disappears and she calls the police. She talks to her friends and Ted's sister about what's happening. Ted remains away. But still the stranger returns with the violence between him and May increasing.

The movie sounds like a violent version of GROUNDHOG DAY but not exactly identical moments being played out, just the nightly attack and the seemingly non-existent help from the police. At one point things take a surreal turn as the detective, officer, social worker and more join in together to sing a song about questioning May. It doesn't help things or the movie.

As the movie developed I found my interest slipping with each new attack and the strange behavior of the characters surrounding May. Thoughts ranged from is she insane and we're seeing this through her eyes? Or could it be that she's in purgatory, forced to relive the same terror night after night? Perhaps this is her husband trying to drive her insane? By the end of the film no answer is presented.

Perhaps that is what made me dislike this movie so much. I'm one who wants a solid pay out to what I've just watched. I want a beginning, middle and end to the films I watch. I loathe movies that leave things up in the air and this movie does that. If I'm willing to invest 83 minutes into watching a movie I want there to be a reason to do so. For me this movie didn't deliver the goods.

On top of that while the see through mask the killer wears is creepy enough we get no background on why he's doing what he's doing. Is he a fan? A stalker? An escaped lunatic? Who knows? And when his mask is finally removed the last piece of the puzzle is given to us only for it to be a new puzzle piece that doesn't fit into the puzzle we were working on.

I usually don't slam a movie too hard. This one does look well shot, the soundtrack is good and Grant delivers a good performance. I don't know if the fault here lies in her script or the direction of Natasha Kermani but somewhere along the line they made a film that's not entertaining and leaves you not wishing there were more but just wishing it were over.

Unwatchable

[antony-69 · 1/10 · 5 August 2021]

Please, for the love of all that is holy, don't bother. Don't press play. Step away from the remote. Don't do it to yourself. You don't deserve the pain that is trying to watch this utter garbage.

A little satirical horror about individualism and other things

[swatter · 7/10 · 29 August 2020]

Although this is billed as a thriller/horror film, I'd place it more in the category of Black Mirror or Twilight Zone in that it's a satire about the state of things in the world, told with surreal/absurd elements. For example there were themes of people being disbelieved, while holding to an every-person-for-themselves attitude, further preventing people from getting support. There's much more to it than that (gender and class) so I'm summarizing very briefly.

Other points: Some of the acting was stiff at times but that became an advantage during brief kafkaesque scenes of the protagonist attempting to communicate. With surreal elements, it often comes with the territory in any case. The music was minimal and rather than announcing everything that was about to happen, it left space for the imagination to fill in the blanks, only containing a few themes that repeated, along with a few key visual leitmotifs.

I can see how a person following this as a literal story with a straightforward protagonist might expect things to go differently, but I felt a definite tension leading up to the end, wondering how the director would play out the themes presented in the story. Perhaps intentionally on the part of the director, while I felt sympathy for the main character, I felt even more for a few of the side characters, especially toward the end of the movie.

Overall I enjoyed the movie, found the themes timely, and will look up other movies by this director.

Unlucky

[westsideschl · 2/10 · 22 October 2021]

1. Poor or non-existent forensics reduced the credibility of the story.

2. Like a poor teacher the storyline does not direct the audience into thinking about the issue of fear, but instead has us asking what's going on. The focus was on knives, hammers, blood on floor, bodies gone.

3. Bodies disappearing opens many interpretations some of which are nonsensical which added to the confusion. Was she hallucinating; a metaphor; ghosts/spirits?

4. The poor response to securing the home & ways of protecting one's self gives us another female victim character as helpless & lacking intelligence.

5. Even the DVDs special feature of production staff audio commentary overlay said nothing about the story itself, but only camera angles, lighting, etc.

A Fairly Solid Metaphor, But a Confusing Thriller

[bsus1412 · 7/10 · 1 November 2020]

I saw this film on Shudder, titled "It's A Secret", so I knew to expect something off the beaten path from a typical horror film. The constant looming presence of the silent killer has a very Michael Myers-esque approach to an abstraction of the turmoil the protagonist faces as she (Goes) It Alone with some fairly well-put together kills along the way, but the climax isn't one for anyone who expects clear answers. I had to stop treating this film as a standard film with a beginning, middle, and end (?) and instead focus on the way she deals with the killer rather than expect any explained reasons why he's there. It gets surreal towards the end, but I can't say I disliked it.

Feel long at under 1hr 15mins..

[rminicoop · 2/10 · 26 October 2021]

I was attracted to the premise of Lucky, but unfortunately it becomes dull quickly.

The police never take her seriously. They never collect evidence (even with pools of blood left behind). We are never told why her husband knows the man comes every night but she has no memory of him. Theres a scene that shows multiple women being attacked by their own individual predators, yet the cops aren't taking it seriously? It would be the only thing in the paper, on the news, etc..but nope. A new pile of dead women every day apparently doesn't concern them at all.

Perhaps the biggest issue is the ending. The film is a metaphor that's about a subtle as a sledgehammer, and that's fine. It's the delivery that's the issue.

A brilliant, if uneven, inversion of the Slasher sub-genre.

[ParabolaofMystery · 8/10 · 16 March 2021]

As far as the movie goes, the concept is prolly the most innovative to hit Slashers since SCREAM.

But do people not understand metaphors anymore? I'm a straight white male, but it wasn't hard to get that this is a movie about all the crap women have to endure every single day. It also wasn't hard to put myself in the protagonist's shoes and feel her frustration.

Finally, 'The Man' is, in form and in movement, the coolest slasher since Ghostface. Even if he gets beaten up EVEN MORE, somehow.

It's a metaphor

[pumpkin_queen-48903 · 7/10 · 13 March 2021]

I don't think a lot of people who have left reviews actually understood this film. It's frustrating and confusing, yes, but it's much deeper than just a horror film. Shows how women have to deal with mysoginy on a daily basis. Wish the ending had explained it a little better, but it's one you can make your own assumptions about

Message falls flat

[hlnmcgu · 1/10 · 2 September 2021]

A very silly film with silly actors and silly script attempting to send an important messy but failing, badly.

Yawn Fest

[Horror_Flick_Fanatic · 4/10 · 11 July 2021]

I forced myself to see it through the end. But I was bored with it.

Many Worlds intepretation of Schrodinger's Rapist

[vasiln · 5/10 · 27 November 2021]

Writer and protagonist Grant has something to say about violence against women-- something to say about the ways that some women are hobbled by fear of violence. Unfortunately, what Grant has to say is not clear.

Is Lucky a study on the meaningless surreality of some of these fears, that their focus is on some masked stranger in a parking garage rather than on one's husband, the vastly more likely source of violence? Or is Lucky instead arguing that those masked strangers are inappropriately disregarded as a legitimate source of fear? Does Lucky argue that women need to stick together to escape their chains? Or does it instead tell us that women should "Go It Alone" because solidarity is hopeless? When Grant angrily insists that her success is 100% a function of her hard work, are we as the audience supposed to be cheering for her self-regard or shaking our heads at her self-importance? Are we invited to think that all men (save our husbands, of course) are responsible for our fear, or are we instead asked if we're failing to see "Schrodinger's Rapist" as something other than an object-- a man with a face, many men with many faces?

Maybe Grant isn't sure about any of that, and Lucky is just asking a lot of questions. Maybe it's less of a manifesto, more of a meditation. But if so, even that uncertainty is unclear. Lucky merely allows us to be reminded of our own questions-- or of our own certainty regarding the answers-- and if we have none, then Lucky doesn't do anything to change that.

That might be okay sometimes. Like Inglorious Basterds, Lucky seems to be fine with you ignoring the critical questions. In Lucky's case, in favor of just watching a poppy, PG-13 thriller. Unfortunately, Lucky doesn't travel the traditional scales of pop. It is a thought experiment, with little relationship to reality, yet never embraces this, never surprises us with any genuine weirdness. Any transformation here is transient-- abandoned in the third act. And there is no reveal, no catharsis; the unmasking has no impact on the movie as a work of entertainment. There is no denouement. The plot questions are never answered.

But it's not poorly made: the acting is generally decent (although there are occasional awkward missteps); it's not overly long; the production values are good. Lucky may not hit the targets it aimed for, but it's an acceptable way to blow an hour and a half.

Absolutely ridiculous

[pedronunesnomundo · 1/10 · 6 January 2022]

First you go "well, that's a nice premise" Then you go "plot thikening" Then you go "you are losing it guys!" Then you go "we are all expecting a miracle, aren't we?"

...And during the last hour it's just pain and tears for the time that you'll never get back.

Confusing & Original

[dar0417 · 6/10 · 9 March 2021]

This film was entertaining and original but sometimes predictable and with the ending not tying loose ends it could have been something better.

Happy death day & groundhog day had a woke baby!

[med-01081 · 5/10 · 4 April 2021]

I dont get all the really bad reviews for this film. It wasnt that bad but it wasn't amazing either just ok. Yes it doesnt explain a lot and yes its a looped plot film but it tries to hard for the deaper meaning than just a typical looped slasher although it probably would have been better if stuck to the loops without the deepness. The acting isnt great and can seem a bit b movie ish at times but they get the job done well enough. It did have potential to be a hell of a lot better but overall it was different from what i expected and i didn't mind that. The direction is the best part of this film. Some good shots and a mellow score with synth elements bring a nice welcomed atmosphere and help set the tone. Its not the best film ever made or the best looped style movie but its worth a watch nonetheless.

Important message in this movie

[Molly_flower · 7/10 · 4 April 2021]

As soon as this movie begins it has you gripped and wanting answers for the crazy going ons. I was super intrigued to where it would lead to. As much as there were some comical parts, and it kept me gripped throughout, i felt like it ended all of a sudden and I was left without answers. I had to go on the internet to read explanations of what it all meant, which I think the message in this movie was a good and important one but maybe if it ended with May doing a monologue or something would have explained it a little better and wrapped it up nicely and would have felt less or a sudden ending.

I really wanted to like this and I did...

[avilaml · 4/10 · 9 March 2021]

Until the credits rolled. I felt like not only had we not finished the movie, but I feel like all the "lessons" we learned along the way didn't mean anything. Whatever ambiguity the story was supposed to leave in the air, completely overpowers any sense of closure or

See? Not so happy when someone only completes 9/10ths of their idea, are you?

An Important Movie

[skyflyerjen-53-760737 · 8/10 · 4 January 2022]

No offense to so many others who gave this movie a poor rating, but I don't think they got it.

This is an important movie--not just for now but always. To this day there is still so much victim-shaming and silence when it comes to attacks on women. This movie puts you in their shoes. Uncomfortably so.

You SHOULD be scared. You SHOULD be mad.

So many times in the movie, people ask, Did you recognize him? Stay vigilant, okay? Women hide their scars and refuse to talk about them...

There is no conflict resolution. At first I was a little put out but then I realized it made sense, because so many victims never get closure. Like I said, this movie isn't afraid to make you uncomfortable.

Please give this movie a try.

Being a woman sucks sometimes

[shaylad2055 · 7/10 · 31 March 2021]

If you don't get the movie then it's not for you. It is a little complex and don't take it as it is. This film is NOT a straightforward slasher, as a lot people seemed to believed it to be. It makes you think and is ultimately depressing. Although I did enjoy the film, it isn't without it's flaws. At some points it falls a little flat and feels messy. This is only the 2nd movie to stress me out while watching it (the first was Mother!) I think you should at least give it a watch for Brea Grant's great performance... And to try to understand the message for it's one everyone could hear.

After reading the synopsis it's unreasonable to think this would be any good

[Xavier_Stone · 2/10 · 19 March 2021]

I read the quick intro and was doubtful, but thought I'd give it a shot as I'm a big fan of looping films and such. However, this opened with some cringey dialogue and acting and after the girl gets started it's more annoying than anything else.

I must say, what a difficult subject to base a movie on. Most people have security cameras with phone access 24/7 and this somehow is trying to get us back to the 1990's with no internet or laptop webcams. Perhaps if it added details from The Ring where the video is unreadable or something I'd give it a go.

This just didn't work at all. The girl becomes very annoying and it's frustrating to watch her go through her paces and I gave up after 20 odd minutes. Not getting any better than the first five minutes. She tries to carry the whole film and she can't even lift her hand above her head, acting-wise.

3 N

[ks-60500 · 2/10 · 3 April 2021]

Non scare, Non sense, Non tense. Movie like this bored me especially it's non sense. If it's a horror I expect more scary n tense moment but this one just fail. The invade is a joke !

No wrap up

[emailmisstawnya · 1/10 · 8 March 2021]

It seemed like it could be great but was really anticlimactic. The end was bad and left you guessing.

What a wasted metaphor....

[richard-davis-987-676615 · 4/10 · 6 October 2022]

Honestly, have a flick through some of the other reviews, and you'll find a few self-worshipping fools chanting the "if you didn't get it, this film's not for you" sort of mantra.

The film is basic surrealism, designed to convey what it's like for women to face real danger, everyday, but to find themselves helpless, ignored and even disbelieved when something very bad happens to them. Great, we get it. We know it. You'd have to be pretty ignorant as a human being to not know that some women face some horrific events in their lives at the hands of men, and all too often the Police are of zero help when it happens to them.

Does this film help?

No, not at all. This film is a basic time-looper that places the victim in her home, day after day, and a "faceless" (masked) man appears everyday to attempt to kill her. The woman faces a lack of interest, help and support from everyone else in the film, including her husband.

Honestly, this film is crud. It's stupid and non-sensical to play the husband in this way. No husband would walk out in such circumstances and in such a way, abandoning his wife so casually and nonchalantly to the hands of a faceless killer.

I get the meaning - however, there was simply no tension, no real drama and no real impact from this film. It would have been far better to have played a real (stalker/harasser/rapist type) story that's actually occurred, and shared the real plight of a real woman, which would have been far more impactful and distressing to watch. It would have created real tension and real fear for people to understand, and help others, who don't seem to "get it" (the plight of many women) understand how powerless many women feel, and the fear that many women feel simply trying to live their lives.

It's a simple premise, but they've chosen a really odd way to present it. It's missed the mark by some distance for me.